Jonathan Taylor Thomas

A talented, intelligent actor who struggled with his status as the ultimate teen idol for a certain generation, Jonathan Taylor Thomas became a star as the mischievous middle son Randy to Tim "The Too...
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Tim Allen is staging a Home Improvement reunion on his new U.S. TV comedy Last Man Standing on Friday (09Jan15) after recruiting his former TV wife Patricia Richardson and son Jonathan Taylor Thomas to appear on the sitcom. Richardson will play a cranky neighbour, while 33-year-old Thomas will make a surprise cameo.

Beloved children's book writer Eric Hill has died, aged 86. The Brit, best known for creating the Spot The Dog series, passed away at his home in California following a brief illness.
A statement from his family reads, "Although this time of loss is a great hardship for us, we can honestly say that we take some solace in the joy he brought to so many children and families through his work. We know Spot, and therefore Eric, has had a beloved presence in so many homes and bedtime readings. And we know we share our grief with many."
Hill worked as a designer and illustrator before coming up with the iconic Spot The Dog character for his son. The first book he wrote, Where's Spot, was published in 1980 and went on to become a sensation and a children's reading staple.
The book series also spawned a spin-off TV show, which aired in both Britain and the U.S. with notable American stars including Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Haley Joel Osment providing the title character's voice.
Hill was made an Officer of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (OBE) in Queen Elizabeth II's 2008 New Year's Honours List.

Buena Vista Pictures via Everett Collection
Once upon a time, the phrases "Circle of Life" and "Hakuna Matata" were not a part of the American lexicon. That was before Disney's The Lion King exploded onto movie screens during the summer of 1994. The tale of the young lion Simba — voiced in the movie by Jonathan Taylor Thomas and Matthew Broderick — who grows up to overthrow the reign of his evil uncle Scar (Jeremy Irons) became a global phenomenon, augmented by the songs of Elton John and Tim Rice. Even if you know that the film was nominated for four Academy Awards, here are some fun facts about the movie that you might not know.
1. The movie was the first Disney feature-length animated film to be created from an original script idea. All of the company's other animated movies had been based either on books or long established fairy tales.
2. The original script was titled King of the Jungle and centered on a battle between lions and baboons. In that version, Scar was the leader of the baboons. At some point during development, the animation team realized that lions don't actually live in the jungle.
3. At one point in the production, animators considered having the song "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" sung entirely by Pumbaa and Timon, much to the horror of John and Rice. A version of the song using Nathan Lane and Ernie Sabella, the voices of the warthog and meerkat, was recorded but not used. Similarly, the song was almost cut from the movie entirely until John lobbied to have it kept in.
4. Many of Disney's top animators at the time didn't work on The Lion King because they were working on the animated film being produced concurrently, Pocahontas. Most people at Disney thought that the historically-based film would be the more prestigious of the two.
5. It was the second Disney animated film, after Beauty and the Beast, to win the Golden Globe for Best Musical or Comedy.
6. When Irons' Scar delivers the line, "You have no idea," it is a direct nod to one of the actor's most famous roles as Claus von Bulow in Reversal of Fortune. In that film, Irons' character delivers the line in answer to his lawyer calling him a "very strange man." In The Lion King, he says it after Simba accuses him of being "so weird."
7. Timon's famous line, "What do you want me to do, dress in drag and dance the hula?" was improvised by Lane.
8. When Irons strained his voice while recording "Be Prepared," actor Jim Cummings, who voices the hyena Ed, stepped in and imitated Irons to get the song finished.
9. Originally, the intention was to pair Cheech Marin with his longtime comedy partner Tommy Chong to voice the hyenas Shenzi and Bonzai. They could never get in touch with Chong to reach an agreement, so Whoopi Goldberg was tapped instead.
10. James Earl Jones and Madge Sinclair, who voice Simba's parents, also play a royal husband and wife in Coming to America, where they reign as the king and queen of a small African country and parents to Eddie Murphy.
11. Scar makes an appearance in a later Disney animated movie. He's seen as a rug during a sequence in Hercules.
12. There was a controversy over the formation of dust during a scene when Simba flops on the ground. Activist Donald Wildmon, founder of the American Family Association, asserted that the dust gathered to form the word "SEX" if you looked at a freeze frame of the scene and was an intentional subliminal message aimed at promoting sexual promiscuity. The producers said that really it was meant to be "SFX," as a reference to the special effects team that was working on the movie. In the films rerelease, some additional dust was added to the scene to blur any letters.
13. There was additional controversy over similarities between the film and a Japanese animated TV series entitled "Kimba the White Lion" that was produced in the 1960s. Disney has maintained that any similarities are coincidental, but Broderick has admitted that he thought that they were adapting "Kimba" when he first saw the script.
14. Three of the songs from the film — "Hakuna Matata," "The Circle of Life," and "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" — were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song. "Can You Feel the Love Tonight" ultimately won the Oscar, and John's version of the song went to No. 4 on the singles chart in the U.S.
15. Rice, who had provided the lyrics for Disney's Aladdin and started his career as the partner of Andrew Lloyd Webber (Jesus Christ Superstar, Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat, Evita), was made a knight by Queen Elizabeth II in 1994. John was knighted in 1998. The duo reteamed for the Broadway musical Aida in 2000.
16. Before playing Timon and Pumbaa, Lane and Sabella had previously worked together in the Broadway revival of Guys and Dolls. After The Lion King, they were paired again on Broadway in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. At first, Lane and Sabella were cast to be two of the hyenas, but their chemistry was so good that they were switched to voicing Simba's pals.
17. Lane and Broderick went on to star as Max Bialystock and Leo Bloom in the Broadway musical version of Mel Brooks' The Producers, and reprised the same roles in the film version. Reportedly, the duo saw each other only once during their voice work for The Lion King… passing each other in a hallway.
18. The stage version of The Lion King, which has been running since 1997, is the highest-grossing Broadway show in history.
19. The Lion King was the second highest grossing movie of 1994, behind Forrest Gump, in the United States, but it easily outdistanced Tom Hanks' movie worldwide and grossed over $768 million during its initial theatrical release.
20. The Lion King remains the highest grossing hand-drawn (or hand-drawn/computer animation combination) film of all time. It's the second highest grossing film in the history of Walt Disney Animation Studios behind only Frozen.
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DreamWorks
For the bulk of every Rocky and Bullwinkle episode, moose and squirrel would engage in high concept escapades that satirized geopolitics, contemporary cinema, and the very fabrics of the human condition. With all of that to work with, there's no excuse for why the pair and their Soviet nemeses haven't gotten a decent movie adaptation. But the ingenious Mr. Peabody and his faithful boy Sherman are another story, intercut between Rocky and Bullwinkle segments to teach kids brief history lessons and toss in a nearly lethal dose of puns. Their stories and relationship were much simpler, which means that bringing their shtick to the big screen would entail a lot more invention — always risky when you're dealing with precious material.
For the most part, Mr. Peabody &amp; Sherman handles the regeneration of its heroes aptly, allowing for emotionally substance in their unique father-son relationship and all the difficulties inherent therein. The story is no subtle metaphor for the difficulties surrounding gay adoption, with society decreeing that a dog, no matter how hyper-intelligent, cannot be a suitable father. The central plot has Peabody hosting a party for a disapproving child services agent and the parents of a young girl with whom 7-year-old Sherman had a schoolyard spat, all in order to prove himself a suitable dad. Of course, the WABAC comes into play when the tots take it for a spin, forcing Peabody to rush to their rescue.
Getting down to personals, we also see the left brain-heavy Peabody struggle with being father Sherman deserves. The bulk of the emotional marks are hit as we learn just how much Peabody cares for Sherman, and just how hard it has been to accept that his only family is growing up and changing.
DreamWorks
But more successful than the new is the film's handling of the old — the material that Peabody and Sherman purists will adore. They travel back in time via the WABAC Machine to Ancient Egypt, the Renaissance, and the Trojan War, and 18th Century France, explaining the cultural backdrop and historical significance of the settings and characters they happen upon, all with that irreverent (but no longer racist) flare that the old cartoons enjoyed. And oh... the puns.
Mr. Peabody &amp; Sherman is a f**king treasure trove of some of the most amazingly bad puns in recent cinema. This effort alone will leave you in awe.
The film does unravel in its final act, bringing the science-fiction of time travel a little too close to the forefront and dropping the ball on a good deal of its emotional groundwork. What seemed to be substantial building blocks do not pay off in the way we might, as scholars of animated family cinema, have anticipated, leaving the movie with an unfinished feeling.
But all in all, it's a bright, compassionate, reasonably educational, and occasionally funny if not altogether worthy tribute to an old favorite. And since we don't have our own WABAC machine to return to a time of regularly scheduled Peabody and Sherman cartoons, this will do okay for now.
If nothing else, it's worth your time for the puns.
3/5
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Tribeca Film via Everett Collection
For a film that involves a love triangle, mental illness, a Bohemian colony of free-spirits, an impending war and several important historical figures, the most exciting elements of Summer in February are the stunning shots of the English country and Cornish seaside. The rest of the film never quite lives up to the crashing waves and sun-dappled meadows that are used to bookend the scenes, as the entertaining opening never manages to coalesce into a story that lives up the the cinematography, let alone the lives of the people that inspired it.
Set in an Edwardian artist’s colony in Cornwall, Summer in February tells the story of A.J. Munnings (Dominic Cooper), who went on to become one of the most famous painters of his day and head of the Royal Academy of Art, his best friend, estate agent and part-time soldier Gilbert Evans (Dan Stevens), and the woman whom they both loved, aspiring artist Florence Carter-Wood (Emily Browning). Her marriage to Munnings was an extremely unhappy one, and she attempted suicide on their honeymoon, before killing herself in 1914. According to his journals, Gilbert and Florence were madly in love, although her marriage and his service in the army kept them apart.
When the film begins, Munnings is the center of attention in the Lamorna Artist's Colony, dramatically reciting poetry at parties and charming his way out of his bar tab while everyone around him proclaims him to be a genius. When he’s not drinking or painting, he’s riding horses with Gilbert, who has the relatively thankless task of keeping this group of Bohemians in line. Their idyllic existence is disrupted by the arrival of Florence, who has run away from her overbearing father and the fiancé he had picked out for her in order to become a painter.
Stevens and Browning both start the film solidly, with enough chemistry between them to make their infatuation interesting. He manages to give Gilbert enough dependable charm to win over both Florence and the audience, and she presents Florence as someone with enough spunk and self-possession to go after what she wants. Browning’s scenes with Munnings are equally entertaining in the first third of the film, as she can clearly see straight through all of his bravado and he is intrigued by her and how difficult she is to impress. Unfortunately, while the basis of the love triangle is well-established and entertaining, it takes a sudden turn into nothing with a surprise proposal from Munnings.
Neither the film nor Browning ever make it clear why Florence accepts his proposal, especially when they have both taken great pains to establish that she doesn’t care much for him. But once she does, the films stalls, and both Stevens and Browning spend the rest of the film doing little more than staring moodily and longingly at the people around them. The real-life Florence was plagued by depression and mental instability, but neither the film nor Browning’s performance ever manage to do more than give the subtlest hint at that darkness. On a few occasions, Browning does manage to portray a genuine anguish, but rather than producing any sympathy from the audience, it simply conjures up images of a different film, one that focused more on Florence, and the difficulties of being a woman with a mental illness at a time when both were ignored or misunderstood.
Stevens is fine, and Gilbert starts out with the same kind of good-guy appeal the won the heart of Mary Crawley and Downton Abbey fans the world over. However, once the film stalls, so does his performance, and he quickly drops everything that made the character attractive or interesting in favor of longing looks and long stretches of inactivity. He does portray a convincing amount of adoration for Florence, although that's about the only real emotion that Gilbert expresses for the vast majority of the film, and even during his love scene, he never manages to give him any amount of passion.
Cooper does his best with what he’s given, and tries his hardest to imbue the film with some substance and drama. His Munnings is by turns charming, brash, and brooding, the kind of person who has been told all of their life that they are special, and believes it. He even manages to give the character some depth, and even though he and Browning have very little chemistry, he manages to convey a genuine affection for her. It’s a shame that Munnings becomes such a deeply unlikable character, because Cooper is the only thing giving Summer in February a jolt of life – even if it comes via bursts of thinly-explained hostility. It's hard to watch just how hard he's working to connect with his co-stars and add some excitement to a lifeless script and not wish that he had a better film to show off his talents in.
Unfortunately, by the time Florence and Gilbert are finally spurred into activity, the film has dragged on for so long that you’re no longer invested in the characters, their pain, or their love story, even if you want to be. Which is the real disappointment of Summer in February; underneath the stalled plot and the relatively one-note acting, there are glimmers of a fascinating and compelling story that’s never allowed to come to the forefront.
2/5
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Summit via Everett Collection
You can imagine that Renny Harlin, director and one quadrant of the writing team for The Legend of Hercules, began his pitch as such: We'll start with a war, because lots of these things start with wars. It feels like this was the principal maxim behind a good deal of the creative choices in this latest update of the Ancient Greek myth. There are always horse riding scenes. There are generally arena battles. There are CGI lions, when you can afford 'em. Oh, and you've got to have a romantic couple canoodling at the base of a waterfall. Weaving them all together cohesively would be a waste of time — just let the common threads take form in a remarkably shouldered Kellan Lutz and action sequences that transubstantiate abjectly to and fro slow-motion.
But pervading through Lutz's shirtless smirks and accent continuity that calls envy from Johnny Depp's Alice in Wonderland performance is the obtrusive lack of thought that went into this picture. A proverbial grab bag of "the basics" of the classic epic genre, The Legend of Hercules boasts familiarity over originality. So much so that the filmmakers didn't stop at Hercules mythology... they barely started with it, in fact. There's more Jesus Christ in the character than there is the Ancient Greek demigod, with no lack of Gladiator to keep things moreover relevant. But even more outrageous than the void of imagination in the construct of Hercules' world is its script — a piece so comically dim, thin, and idiotic that you will laugh. So we can't exactly say this is a totally joyless time at the movies.
Summit via Everett Collection
Surrounding Hercules, a character whose arc takes him from being a nice enough strong dude to a nice enough strong dude who kills people and finally owns up to his fate — "Okay, fine, yes, I guess I'm a god" — are a legion of characters whose makeup and motivations are instituted in their opening scenes and never change thereafter. His de facto stepdad, the teeth-baring King Amphitryon (Scott Adkins), despises the boy for being a living tribute to his supernatural cuckolding; his half-brother Iphicles (Liam Garrigan) is the archetypical scheming, neutered, jealous brother figure right down to the facial scar. The dialogue this family of mongoloids tosses around is stunningly brainless, ditto their character beats. Hercules can't understand how a mystical stranger knows his identity, even though he just moments ago exited a packed coliseum chanting his name. Iphicles defies villainy and menace when he threatens his betrothed Hebe (Gaia Weiss), long in love with Hercules, with the terrible fate of "accepting [him] and loving [their] children equally!" And the dad... jeez, that guy must really be proud of his teeth.
With no artistic feat successfully accomplished (or even braved, really) by this movie, we can at the very least call it inoffensive. There is nothing in The Legend of Hercules with which to take issue beyond its dismal intellect, and in a genre especially prone to regressive activity, this is a noteworthy triumph. But you might not have enough energy by the end to award The Legend of Hercules with this superlative. Either because you'll have laughed yourself into a coma at the film's idiocy, or because you'll have lost all strength trying to fend it off.
1/5
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Lions Gate via Everett Collection
When we last left our heroes, they had conquered all opponents in the 74th Annual Hunger Games, returned home to their newly refurbished living quarters in District 12, and fallen haplessly to the cannibalism of PTSD. And now we're back! Hitching our wagons once again to laconic Katniss Everdeen and her sweet-natured, just-for-the-camera boyfriend Peeta Mellark as they gear up for a second go at the Capitol's killing fields.
But hold your horses — there's a good hour and a half before we step back into the arena. However, the time spent with Katniss and Peeta before the announcement that they'll be competing again for the ceremonial Quarter Quell does not drag. In fact, it's got some of the film franchise's most interesting commentary about celebrity, reality television, and the media so far, well outweighing the merit of The Hunger Games' satire on the subject matter by having Katniss struggle with her responsibilities as Panem's idol. Does she abide by the command of status quo, delighting in the public's applause for her and keeping them complacently saturated with her smiles and curtsies? Or does Katniss hold three fingers high in opposition to the machine into which she has been thrown? It's a quarrel that the real Jennifer Lawrence would handle with a castigation of the media and a joke about sandwiches, or something... but her stakes are, admittedly, much lower. Harvey Weinstein isn't threatening to kill her secret boyfriend.
Through this chapter, Katniss also grapples with a more personal warfare: her devotion to Gale (despite her inability to commit to the idea of love) and her family, her complicated, moralistic affection for Peeta, her remorse over losing Rue, and her agonizing desire to flee the eye of the public and the Capitol. Oftentimes, Katniss' depression and guilty conscience transcends the bounds of sappy. Her soap opera scenes with a soot-covered Gale really push the limits, saved if only by the undeniable grace and charisma of star Lawrence at every step along the way of this film. So it's sappy, but never too sappy.
In fact, Catching Fire is a masterpiece of pushing limits as far as they'll extend before the point of diminishing returns. Director Francis Lawrence maintains an ambiance that lends to emotional investment but never imposes too much realism as to drip into territories of grit. All of Catching Fire lives in a dreamlike state, a stark contrast to Hunger Games' guttural, grimacing quality that robbed it of the life force Suzanne Collins pumped into her first novel.
Once we get to the thunderdome, our engines are effectively revved for the "fun part." Katniss, Peeta, and their array of allies and enemies traverse a nightmare course that seems perfectly suited for a videogame spin-off. At this point, we've spent just enough time with the secondary characters to grow a bit fond of them — deliberately obnoxious Finnick, jarringly provocative Johanna, offbeat geeks Beedee and Wiress — but not quite enough to dissolve the mystery surrounding any of them or their true intentions (which become more and more enigmatic as the film progresses). We only need adhere to Katniss and Peeta once tossed in the pit of doom that is the 75th Hunger Games arena, but finding real characters in the other tributes makes for a far more fun round of extreme manhunt.
But Catching Fire doesn't vie for anything particularly grand. It entertains and engages, having fun with and anchoring weight to its characters and circumstances, but stays within the expected confines of what a Hunger Games movie can be. It's a good one, but without shooting for succinctly interesting or surprising work with Katniss and her relationships or taking a stab at anything but the obvious in terms of sending up the militant tyrannical autocracy, it never even closes in on the possibility of being a great one.
3.5/5
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How could you not remember Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor? Throughout the '90s, Tim, his excellently-bearded Tool Time co-host Al, and his well-groomed suburban family were as much a part of our collective consciousness as Monica Lewinsky's blue dress. Here's a look back at the very show that redefined the possibilities of the sitcom. Oh wait, that was Seinfeld. Still, let's hit the rewind button and revisit Home Improvement.
ABC
Detroit Was a Safe PlaceNowadays, Detroit-set TV shows often feature deadbeats, criminals, and dirty cops, as AMC's new drama Low Winter Sun can clearly attest. But once upon a time, a proper Midwestern family named the Taylors resided rather normally in the Motor City's suburbs. To Home Improvement's writers, Detroit was not only a great place to raise a family, it also came with a bodiless neighbor named Wilson. He gave great advice too!
Three Letters – JTTBefore there was Justin Bieber and those dudes from One Direction, the majority of the country's prepubescent teenage girls had posters of Jonathan Taylor Thomas plastered across their bedroom walls. Thomas, who played the middle child Randy, left the show during the eighth season to attend college and focus on different projects. He has since starred as Customer #3 in a 2005 short film called Tilt A Whirl, so you can see how well that worked out.
Pam Anderson Was the First Tool GirlBefore she was starring alongside Tommy Lee in a widely circulated sex tape, the buxom blond starred as Lisa the Tool Girl on the show's first two seasons. Of course Anderson would leave Home Improvement to really delve into her craft as C.J. Parker on Baywatch. Now there was a demanding role!
Tim Liked to GruntRich and manly-sounding, Tim's grunt played as prominent a role on Home Improvement as the ubiquitous laugh track that incessantly told viewers when something was funny. There was never any rhyme or reason as to why he grunted like an idiot all the time (the verbal tic had been a part of star Tim Allen's stand-up act), but that was okay. What more can you expect from someone who's nicknamed The Tool Man?
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After Dark Films
It seems a bit odd to take on a movie review of Courtney Solomon's Getaway, as only in the loosest terms is Getaway actually a movie. We begin without questions — other than a vague and frustrating "What the hell is going on?" — and end without answers, watching Ethan Hawke drive his car into things (and people) for the hour and a half in between. We learn very little along the way, probed to engage in the mystery of the journey. But we don't, because there's no reason to.
There's not a single reason to wonder about any of the things that happen to Hawke's former racecar driver/reformed criminal — forced to carry out a series of felonious commands by a mysterious stranger who is holding his wife hostage — because there doesn't seem to be a single ounce of thought poured into him beyond what he see. We learn, via exposition delivered by him to gun-toting computer whiz Selena Gomez, that he "did some bad things" before meeting the love of his life and deciding to put that all behind him. Then, we stop learning. We stop thinking. We start crashing into police cars and Christmas trees and power plants.
Why is Selena Gomez along for the ride? Well, the beginnings of her involvement are defensible: Hawke is carrying out his slew of vehicular crimes in a stolen car. It's her car. And she's on a rampage to get it back. But unaware of what she's getting herself into, Gomez confronts an idling Hawke with a gun, is yanked into the automobile, and forced to sit shotgun while the rest of the driver's "assignments" are carried out. But her willingness to stick by Hawke after hearing his story is ludicrous. Their immediate bickering falls closer to catty sexual tension than it does to genuine derision and fear (you know, the sort of feelings you'd have for someone who held you up or forced you into accessorizing a buffet of life-threatening crimes).
After Dark Films
The "gradual" reversal of their relationship is treated like something we should root for. But with so little meat packed into either character, the interwoven scenes of Hawke and Gomez warming up to each other and becoming a team in the quest to save the former's wife serve more than anything else as a breather from all the grotesque, impatient, deliberately unappealing scenes of city wreckage.
And as far as consolidating the mystery, the film isn't interested in that either, as evidenced by its final moments. Instead of pressing focus on the answers to whatever questions we may have, the movie's ultimate reveal is so weak, unsubstantial, and entirely disconnected to the story entirely, that it seems almost offensive to whatever semblance of a film might exist here to go out on this note. Offensive to the idea of film and story in general, as a matter of fact. But Getaway isn't concerned with these notions. Not with story, character, logic, or humanity. It just wants to show us a bunch of car crashes and explosions. So you'd think it might have at least made those look a little better.
1/5
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Made his feature acting debut in "Man of the House," co-starring Farrah Fawcett and Chevy Chase (filmed in 1994)

Cast in a Burger King commercial at age eight

On his first trip to L.A., landed role on CBS' short-lived "The Bradys" as Greg's son Kevin

Appeared in three episodes of "8 Simple Rules for Dating My Teenage Daughter" as Bridget's study partner-turned-crush

Cast as Randy Taylor on the ABC sitcom "Home Improvement"; left series during the 1998-1999 season to pursue education

Summary

A talented, intelligent actor who struggled with his status as the ultimate teen idol for a certain generation, Jonathan Taylor Thomas became a star as the mischievous middle son Randy to Tim "The Tool Man" Taylor (Tim Allen) on "Home Improvement" (ABC, 1991-99). The breakout star of the hit series, Thomas was dubbed "JTT" by young fans and showered with kid-friendly plaudits, including a Nickelodeon Kids' Choice Award. After lending his raspy voice to the young Simba in Disney's "The Lion King" (1994), Thomas toplined the kids vs. adults comedy "Man of the House" (1995), the Mark Twain adaptation "Tom and Huck" (1995), the adventure "Wild America" (1997) and the holiday comedy "I'll Be Home for Christmas" (1998). After leaving "Home Improvement" that same year, Thomas tackled grittier, more challenging roles in projects like "Speedway Junky" (1999), which led to rumors that he was gay. Denying the rumors, Thomas focused on his education and while he continued to make a handful of small appearances, including recurring roles on "Smallville" (The WB, 2001-06; The CW, 2006-2011) and "8 Simple Rules" (ABC, 2002-05), as well as providing voicework for "The Wild Thornberrys" (Nickelodeon, 1998-2004) and "The Simpsons" (Fox, 1989- ), Thomas seemed happier to remain out of the spotlight. Although his massive popularity as a teen idol eclipsed his impressive acting talent, Jonathan Taylor Thomas remained one of the most fondly regarded crushes of many viewers, leaving many to hope that he would one day launch his comeback as an adult.

Name

Role

Comments

Stephen Weiss

Father

divorced from Claudine Weiss in 1991

Claudine Weiss

Mother

divorced from Stephen Weiss in 1991; manages Thomas' career

Joel Weiss

Brother

born c. 1978

Education

Name

Columbia University

Harvard University

Notes

"I'm used to having all these other actors and actresses around. In this case I didn't. I was there in a room alone and I had to not only play my character, but the person I was talking to. I had to get inside their head so I could know what Simba would be reacting to." – Thomas on voicing Simba in the animated hit "The Lion King," quoted in Los Angeles Times, Aug. 23, 1994.

"Mr. Thomas, familiar to viewers of "Home Improvement" for his role as the middle of Tim Allen's three sons, is unnervingly polished as the manipulative Ben [in "Man of the House"]. His smooth performance suggests that the young actor is considerably more sophisticated than the character he is playing.

"Although Mr. Chase goes through his familiar paces ably enough, he is no match for Mr. Thomas..."

– From "An Obstacle Course For a Future Stepfather" (a film review of Disney's "Man of the House") by Stephen Holden in The New York Times, March 3, 1995

"I've made a point not to make this my whole life. There are other sides to my personality and other sides to my life. If this business went away, it would be a blow, because I've put a lot into it, but it wouldn't be devastating because I have an education. If it ends, it ends...but right now things are going pretty well." – Thomas quoted in the Los Angeles Times, Dec. 21, 1995

"You are a part of their life, and there is a lot that is owed them, but it's difficult because you want to make everyone happy, but if you try to do that, you're setting yourself up for failure." – Thomas on his fans, quoted in The New York Times, June 29, 1997.

"Some kids have paper routes. I do TV and movies. It's just a different type of job, no big deal." – Thomas to the New York Post, December 21, 1995

"Jonathan is very uncorrupted by his success. He has an innate cool. He's alarmingly adult, but then, he was alarmingly adult when he was nine. He would bring a newspaper to the set with him everyday and read it cover to cover, and then he'd want to discuss it. And he could." – "Home Improvement" co-star Patricia Richardson on Thomas, quoted in US, Aug 1997

"I didn't try to invite the celebrity aspect into my life. I invited the work. If you could be a celebrity without being a 'celebrity', that would be me. I would love that. I don't like all that attention." – Thomas quoted in USA Weekend, Oct. 31-Nov. 2, 1997

"It's not easy to walk away from a place you've been for almost eight years of your life – and eight impressionable years. This is my junior year of high school, the big year colleges look at, and I've got three Advanced Placement classes. I have to be a student and can't work 65 hours a week as well." – Thomas on leaving "Home Improvement" to concentrate on his studies, quoted in Los Angeles Times, Nov. 15, 1998

"I thought, 'If I'm going to grow as an actor, I need to challenge myself'. I didn't do these pieces to change my image. I did them for me. I had an attachment to these actors." – Thomas on taking roles in "Speedway Junkie" and "Common Ground," quoted in The Advocate, February 1, 2000.